


Bleed Just to Know You're Alive

by secondalto



Series: Written in Flesh and Blood [8]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Incredible Hulk (2008)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Bruce Banner Feels, Bruce Banner Needs a Hug, F/M, Past Relationship(s), Platonic Soulmates, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-19
Updated: 2014-07-19
Packaged: 2018-02-09 11:50:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,506
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1981905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/secondalto/pseuds/secondalto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the accident takes away Bruce's soul mark, things change.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bleed Just to Know You're Alive

**Author's Note:**

> If you do have triggers, please pay attention to the tags.
> 
> All things about Dayton and WSU are true as I live in the Dayton area and am a graduate of WSU. GO RAIDERS!
> 
> With thanks as always to Rainne.

Robert Bruce Banner might have been the poster child for the anti-soul mark movement. But not until he reached his teens.

For most of his childhood, everything seems fine. When Bruce is born, his father is working for the military at Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio. They are doing studies on radiation and how to weaponize it. Brian also does the occasional guest lecturer job out at the newly-formed Wright State University. Some of Bruce’s fondest memories are of running up and down the corridors of Allyn Hall. (In later years he will become an avid fan of the basketball team and unironically wear a shirt that reads ‘Wright State Football Undefeated since 1968’.) Rebecca, his mother, will take him to see the bicycle shop where the Wright brothers catapulted man into the skies.

It’s the history of the city that first sparks Bruce’s imagination. He wants to learn everything, and does. But that’s when things start to go sour. He hears his father’s ramblings about what Brian’s work may have done to him and in turn to Bruce. Brian starts to lash out. Bruce has seen both of his parents’ marks. He can’t understand why his father is so angry, so full of rage at the one person who is supposed to be his soul mate. When Brian starts to threaten Bruce, Rebecca steps in, resulting in her death.

Bruce watches as her name fades from his father’s arm. He runs, hides, and calls the police. He testifies at his father’s trial. He feels nothing when Brian is sent away and Bruce goes to live with an aunt and uncle. Bruce continues to learn. He focuses on science, on radiation. He wants to know if anything his father said might be true. He makes a promise to himself that he will always follow his heart, never the name he might get.

That all changes when he meets Elizabeth “Betty” Ross. Her name appears when Bruce is twenty-six. It’s a delicate rose-pink script that wraps around his forearm. She is as beautiful as the mark, with a mind to match. But he finds out that she doesn’t have his name. She has no name at all.

Bruce struggles to understand how that can work. The literature on soul marks is full of stories about this kind of thing, but they never say how anyone deals with it. How can she be his soul mate, but he isn’t hers? It seems so incongruous to him. They decide to date anyway. Bruce lets himself love Betty. He believes she loves him too, despite the marks. There is always a nagging doubt in the back of his mind, but he learns to ignore it.

Betty’s father turns out to be a grade-A asshole. Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross will never think a scrawny, rumpled physics major will ever be good enough for his daughter. Bruce will endure all nine circles of hell if it means being with Betty. When they get to Culver, Bruce immerses himself in work with radiation. It turns out his father was just a raving, paranoid mad man. But the work brings him to the attention of the military and General Ross. He suspects the work they want him to do is far more than radiation protection, but it’s worthwhile enough that he doesn’t voice his suspicions.

When animal trials don’t produce the results he wants, Bruce gets frustrated. He and Betty are reading the latest results when he gets an idea.

“I should test it on myself,” he says.

Betty looks up at him, eyes wide, shaking her head. “Bruce, don’t be crazy.”

“No, Betty, we’re getting nowhere. These tests aren’t working. We need a human subject.”

“Why does it have to be you?” she yells.

“Why not? Betty it needs to be done,” he insists. She gets up from the chair and pushes at him.

“The radiation alone will kill you if the serum isn’t effective!” She’s near tears. Bruce pulls her to him.

“But if it is, I’ll be fine. Betty, if not me, it’s gonna be some random soldier. Do you really want to do that to someone else’s family?”

“No, Bruce, you are asking me to do it to myself!” She runs out of the lab, tears streaming down her face.

Eventually he talks her into it by showing her the data. The likelihood of anything bad happening is very low. She agrees reluctantly, but he makes sure she stays outside of the testing area. He finds himself in the seat, chin strap chafing. An assistant injects him, walking out of the room and locking the doors. Bruce stares at the machine above him, the one that will subject him to the gamma radiation. He sees Betty on the other side of the glass. Then the machine whirs to life and all he sees is green.

*~*~*~*~*~*

_Anger._

_Smash. Destroy. Roar._

_Woman. Know woman. Woman scared._

_Man. Man angry. Hurt man. Woman hurt._

*~*~*~*~*~*

When Bruce wakes up in the middle of a park, half naked, he’s surprised someone hasn’t called the cops on him. He shakes his head, banishing the flashes of images from his head. They are a blur, like a badly filmed movie. Then he sees Betty in his mind. He has to go find her. He gets up and glances down at his arm. Her name is gone. All that is left behind is the vast display of pale skin.

The serum.

Something about the serum in combination with the gamma radiation must have suppressed it, erased it from his body. Bruce can’t think about what this means. He needs to get to Betty. He finds out which hospital she was taken to and puppy-dog-eyes his way in to see her. She got hurt because of him. Bruce will never forgive himself for that. He should have listened to her. She looks so pale and so delicate lying in that bed. He holds her hand, wishing that she’d had his name. Wondering if it would have disappeared.

When the General shows up, Bruce leaves quickly. He is surprised that Ross doesn’t put cuffs on him then and there. Maybe it’s because of Betty. He may be an asshole, but Ross does love Betty. Bruce realizes that once the General does come to his senses, Bruce will be in danger. Bruce runs. He takes only what he needs, nothing that can be tracked. He leaves it all behind. He hitchhikes, does odds jobs for cash and relies on the kindness of strangers.

Almost three years later he still can’t quite remember how he got to Brazil, but there he is, learning Portuguese from watching Sesame Street. But he’s learned a lot about himself since he left Culver, left Betty. He had a handful of episodes in those first few months. But each one of them taught him more about the _thing_ inside him. It’s been five months since he last transformed. Elevated heart rate is a major trigger, so Bruce struggles each and every day to remain calm. He even buys himself a pulse monitor. Bruce learns Brazilian jujitsu, not just for the breathing techniques, but so he can defend himself. He’s still a skinny physics professor after all.

He seeks out a cure, using medicinals that the locals talk about, things the major pharmaceutical companies know nothing about. Bruce does this with the help of someone he found online. They call themselves Mr. Blue. Bruce is, of course, Mr. Green. Bruce wants – needs - to find a cure, to rid himself of what is inside of him. Every time he contacts Mr. Blue, he looks at a picture cut from a newspaper. It’s of Betty. Everything he does is so that he can get back to her. So that he can be the man he wants to be for her.

But the peace of his world is soon shattered. Ross has found him. And he’s dealing with dicks from the factory. Sometimes Bruce wishes he wasn’t such a nice guy. The monitor on his wrist is a constant sound as he runs. Its beeping reminds him that he can’t lose control here, in the middle of the city. He runs to the factory. He is confronted by the gang. And then there are shots and everything goes hazy for a while.

*~*~*~*~*

When Bruce awakens it is to a persistent ache in all of his bones and muscles. It should hurt. The transformation defies all laws of physics. He can’t find his shirt and his pants are in tatters. It is a wonder he isn’t completely naked. He struggles to his feet, clutching at his pants. He wanders to the road, flags down a truck. The driver tells him that he is no longer in Brazil, but Guatemala. The… creature has taken him north, to another country. Maybe this is a sign.

Mr. Blue wants more data after Bruce sent him blood. The data is at Culver. Bruce would be going closer to Ross, something that goes against everything he’s been trying to do for the last year. And it will bring him closer to Betty. There is always a part of him that wants to see Betty. His heart aches with the want every second of every day. He spends a day in the streets, begging for coins and thinking about what he should do.

It takes him a week to beg and earn enough money to pay for passage north. One driver takes him to the Mexican border for a day’s labor. Once in Mexico, Bruce does more labor, earns more. It is honest work, things that keep the monster in his head at bay. He wishes he could afford another pulse monitor. Crossing back into the States is ridiculously easy. He uses public transportation and hitchhiking to get to Virginia. He quickly figures out that getting to the data won’t be as easy.

When he’s leaving campus, he sees Betty. He’s sure his heart rate is cycling upwards. Fast. He breathes, trying to calm himself. She’s sitting on a bench, her appearance unchanged. Bruce wants nothing more than to step out of the shadows and say something to her. But then he sees another man approach her. She greets the man with a kiss to the cheek and they leave, holding hands. Of course she’s found someone else. Bruce resolves to do what he came to do anyway. He has always wanted to get rid of the thing in his head. This changes nothing.

He visits Sal, finding a room and a way onto the campus. Using his charm and pizza he gets to the labs. They’ve changed, housing computers now. But he stands outside the room, visualizing how it looked before. He remembers Betty giving him a kiss for luck before she stepped out of the room. He remembers wishing he could mouth ‘I love you’ to her but for the chinstrap. He remembers the vision of green. Bruce shakes his head and goes to work.

The data isn’t here. Ross must have had someone take it all. He needs to leave. Just by being here he is putting Betty in danger. He goes back to Sal’s. He packs and goes downstairs to say goodbye to his friend. Betty is there. She sees him. Bruce panics, grabs his gear and runs to the alley. He can hear footsteps behind him. He hides next to a dumpster.

“Bruce?” Betty’s voice is trembling, breathless.

He hangs his head. He will not go to her. Every fiber in his being tells him to answer her, go to her, but he can’t. Won’t. Once she’s returned to the safety of the pizzeria, he leaves. He wanders down the road, ignoring the cold of the rain. He puts his thumb out for passing cars, hoping for someone to stop. When someone does, he has this feeling. Then Bruce hears the car door opening and he turns. Betty. She is standing there, looking at him and everything he feels, wants, needs, coalesces into action.

He runs to her. She runs to meet him. They cling to one another.

“Don’t go,” she whispers against his neck. “Don’t go. I want you to come with me now. Please. Come with me. Please.”

He can’t say anything so he just nods. She leads him to her car and watches as he gets in. The ride to her home is silent. The comfortable familiarity is soothing to Bruce. When they get there, she makes him go right to the bathroom to dry off. When he has changed into the only set of spare clothes he has, she sits down with him. Betty takes his arm, caresses where his mark had been.

“Bruce, I’m so sorry.” She strokes his arm again. It takes all that he has not to lean closer and kiss her.

“It’s okay, Betty. I’ve lived with it since… I’ve lived with it.” He doesn’t ask if she is still without a mark. He doesn’t know how he would handle it if she had gotten one. The mark shouldn’t mean that much to him. Bruce still loves Betty, even if his mark is gone. The feelings they have for each other should be and can be stronger than a name on the body. But deep inside - in a corner so dark, Bruce sometimes forgets it’s there - is the truth that it does matter to him, has always mattered to him.

She smiles and turns. She takes something off of the table and hands it to him. It’s a small, silver, oval-shaped box.

“It’s our data,” she explains as he opens it. “I got in there before they carted it all away.”

He lifts out a thumb drive.

“I hoped somewhere that it might tell us something someday.”

He dangles it from his fingers, waving it at her. “Does the General know that you have this?”

“No,” she shakes her head. “I don’t think so. I haven’t spoken to him in a couple of years.”

“You have to be sure,” he insists. The data on the drive is dangerous. Ross will stop at nothing to get it.

“Bruce, I don’t understand why we just can’t go in there together and talk to him.”

“He told me what he wanted to do,” Bruce sighs. He wishes he didn’t have to Betty this. “He wants it out of me. He wants to dissect it so that he can replicate it. He wants to make it a weapon.”

“Oh, God, Bruce…,” she touches him and he closes his eyes. His every nerve is screaming out at him. It’s been too long since anyone has come this close to him without murderous intent. He extricates himself from her touch. She lets him stay the night. He wishes he could stay longer. But it still isn’t safe for him to be there. Even more so now he has the data. Lying in bed that night, he thinks of how close he is to Betty and yet he is still so far away. He rubs at his arm until he falls asleep.

The next afternoon finds them back on campus. From here Bruce can find a bus out of town. Betty helps make him blend in a little. Bruce tries not to react to her touch. He catches movement out of the corner of his eye. He tells Betty to run while turning and moving away from her at the same time. He makes it to the library, retrieves the drive from his pack and swallows it down. He runs again, but is trapped in the walkway. He can see Ross and his soldiers gathered out in the field. Betty is there.

Ross fires smoke bombs at Bruce. He takes off his button-up, tries to cover his mouth. There is no way out. Other than… he will not let the monster out. Until he sees Betty trying to get to him. She is tackled to the ground by her father’s men. Bruce feels it screaming and cannot hold it back any longer. With a roar, the thing in his head lets loose.

*~*~*~*~*

_Woman hurt. Save woman._

_Angry man. Other man._

_Stinging things. Hurt. Smash. Destroy._

_Pain. Sound hurt ears. Hear woman. Save woman._

_Smash. Destroy. Harm._

_Woman run. Woman not afraid._

“Bruce?”

_Woman say name. Not name._

_Thing in sky. More stinging things. Protect woman._

_Woman hurt. Take woman away._

_Cave. Woman safe here._

_Woman pretty._

_Woman make noise. Scared._

“Bruce.”

_Not name. Maybe name._

_Noise. Hate noise._

_Woman near. Stop woman._

“It’s okay.” _Woman speak. Woman hold hand._ “Come here. Come this way.” _Woman lead_. “Watch your head.” _Sit._ “We’re okay. It’s okay. It’s just the rain.”

_Like woman. Woman nice._

*~*~*~*~*~

This time Bruce wakes up to Betty’s gentle hand on his back.

“Bruce, are you okay? Can you walk?”

He blinks up at her, trying to make sure he’s covered. “Betty? Are you…? Did it…?”

“I’m fine, Bruce. You brought me here. Kept me safe. I found a motel, if you can walk.”

He just nods and lets her help him up. Once safely in the room, he goes to shower. Betty tells him she’ll be back, she’s going to find him new clothes. The sputtering shower head triggers memories of gunfire. He falls to the floor of the tub, shuddering. Betty came so close to death. He can’t understand how or why the thing inside him didn’t kill her. It’s always been emotions - rage, anger, and fear - nothing more. He’s not sure he wants to understand it.

Bruce retrieves the hard drive. It’s not a pretty thing but it has to be done. When Betty returns, she doesn’t just have clothes but a new pulse monitor for him. He gladly puts it on his wrist. Soon he’s telling her everything she can and can’t take if she’s to run off with him. He looks at her and then they are kissing.

His mind whirls as he touches her everywhere. She’s pushing his shirt off his shoulder, trying to tug at the undershirt to get him naked. Betty pulls him down to the bed, cradling him between her legs. He’s kissing her neck, breathing in her smell. Then his brain finally registers the insistent beeping of the monitor. He pulls back sighs.

“I’m sorry, I can’t. I can’t get too excited.” He starts to back away but Betty stops him.

“It’s okay,” she says. “I understand.”

He takes one more look at her, taking in her body. He memorizes every inch of unmarked skin. He traces a finger over her shoulder and down her arm.

“You still haven’t….”

She gives him a wan smile. “No, I haven’t. I’ve not gotten your name, or another name. I think I might be in the unlucky ten percent. I can’t explain how that works.”

“Me either. I wish I could, Betty. I wish I could understand how you were – are – my soul mate, but I’m not yours. I love you, Betty Ross. I always will.”

She takes his hand and pulls him down to the bed to lie down next to her. “And I love you, Bruce Banner.” He tries not to notice she doesn’t add anything to the simple statement.

They spend the night holding each other. The next day they find an out-of-the -ay store where Bruce can send the information to Mr. Blue. Betty takes his picture in front of the beat-up truck they buy after pawning Betty’s necklace. Bruce has a small amount of hope that maybe, just maybe, he can be cured. While they are making their way to New York, Betty asks him a question.

“What is it like? When it happens. What do you experience?”

He thinks about it for a moment before answering. “Remember those experiments we volunteered for at Harvard? The induced hallucinations?” She nods. “It’s a lot like them, but a thousand times amplified. It’s like someone’s poured a liter of acid into my brain.”

She takes a hand off the wheel long enough to lay it on his arm. “Do you remember anything?”

“Just fragments, images. There’s too much noise. I can never derive anything out of it,” Bruce says. He wishes he could; then maybe he could understand it.

“Well then it’s still you inside…,” Betty starts to insist.

“No. It’s not.” Bruce is emphatic about this.

“I don’t know,” Betty counters. “In the cave it really felt like it knew me. Maybe your mind is in there, just overcharged and can’t process what’s happening.”

“I don’t want to control it. I want to get rid of it. Once it’s gone I’ll get my mark back.” Bruce turns his head so he can see the countryside going by. Betty turns on the radio. The incident at Culver is gaining national attention. The press seems to have dubbed the creature “the Hulk”. Well, at least he has a name he can call it. If he wanted to. Which he doesn’t. To give it a name makes it real, makes it something that he should care about. Bruce doesn’t want to care.

*~**~*~*~*~*

As Bruce is kissing Betty one last time in the helicopter, he is hoping that Sterns’s cure didn’t work. All the time and effort spent hoping and wishing and wanting the cure, now he needs to use the creature inside his head to save Harlem. He jumps, waiting for the thing to come out. When he realizes it isn’t coming he swears. He thinks maybe it’s a good thing Betty never got his name; now she won’t have to see it disappear. The last thing he feels is hitting the concrete.

*~*~*~*~*~*

_Fight monster._

_Save woman._

_Help people._

_Hulk help._

“HULK SMASH!”

_Woman say no kill. Hulk want kill. Keep woman safe._

“Bet-ty.”

_Woman safe._

_Monster stopped._

_Bright light._

_Keep woman safe._

*~*~*~*~**~

This time when Bruce wakes up he vows to stay away. The creature – the Hulk – ran to keep Betty safe. He should at least do the same. He struggles for a long time to finally master the control he told Betty he didn’t want. There are still incidents, which is why he is constantly on the run. He learns basic first aid, helping out in small villages where he can. He uses local remedies, things that seem to work better than anything over the counter.

He does keep track of Betty. He uses Culver’s website and other means. When social media starts to really get off the ground he keeps multiple accounts under assumed names to see what she is doing, how she is. Bruce is in Greenland when he sees it on her Facebook page. She’s getting married. To the man he saw her with that first day at Culver. His name is Leonard.

She deserves to be happy. He shouldn’t blame her for moving on. When he left, that was a pretty good way to break up. But the news hits him hard. Seeing Betty smiling for the cameras hits him harder. She loves another man. He’ll never know for sure if she really loved him, if she ever did. She never got his name.

A gun is ridiculously easy to buy here. He acquires one for almost nothing at all. He takes it to the small room he is renting. Bruce sits on the bed, turning it over and over in his hands. He opens it up, takes out the bullets and stares at them. Such small things to do such damage. He reloads. He puts the gun on the table. He won’t do it here; he likes his landlady too much. He will find a ride out to the middle of nowhere. He is the eccentric American; no one will question his reasons.

The next day, Jan takes him out to the cold and remote plain on the edge of town. Bruce waves as Jan drives back, probably muttering about the crazy scientist. He takes the gun out of his pocket, holding it loosely in his hand as he walks. He walks and walks until he can barely see the outline of the houses. He sits down, ignoring the cold ground. He opens the gun one last time to check if all the bullets are in there. He strokes his arm through the bulky coat, remembering Betty’s name there. He puts the gun in his mouth, thinks a quiet goodbye to the only woman he will ever love and closes his eyes.

He pulls the trigger.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*

_Hulk spit out thing. Thing lands in hand. Thing taste bad._

_Small thing. Like stinging things that hit Hulk._

_Why man use thing?_

_Crush shiny thing._

_HULK ANGRY._

_Man try to hurt Hulk._

_Why?_

_Hulk smash._

_Hulk smash._

*~*~*~*~*~*

The bullet is held tightly in Bruce’s fist when he wakes up. He weeps and rages, almost bringing the creature back. He finds his way back to shelter and sits in his room for a week before he realizes he needs to move on again. He knows he can’t try that again. He may never die. He doesn’t know. He wants to care, but he’s too numb.

*~*~**~*~*~*~*

Bruce decides that if he is going to have to live in the world, he might as well do some good. He gets his hands on every medical text book he can. He moves away from the States, skipping northern Europe in favor of North Africa and the Mediterranean coast line. He masochistically still keeps tabs on Betty, though not as frequently as he used to. Bruce learns how to keep the creature – the Other Guy, he decides to call it – at bay.

Four years after Culver he finds himself in India. He’s working to help a village get through an outbreak of a sickness he can’t quite identify. He’s finishing up with a family when a tiny young girl appears at the stairs. She pleads with him to help her father. Bruce finishes washing his hands, gathers his bag and follows her. She leads him through the streets, to the outskirts of town. As he follows her into the house, he sees her climbing out a window.

“Should have got paid up front, Banner,” he chides himself as he stands there.

“You know, for a man who’s supposed to be avoiding stress, you picked a hell of a place to settle,” she says.

He hears the rustling of fabric and turns slowly, quietly. A woman appears from behind some curtains. She’s beautiful, Bruce isn’t blind. She isn’t military; Bruce doubts that Ross has learned subtlety. She steps out to where he is.

Bruce gives her a small smile. “Avoiding stress isn’t the secret.”

“Then what is it? Yoga?”

“You brought me to the edge of the city. Smart,” he replies, avoiding the subject. “I uh… assume the whole place is surrounded?” He looks out a window, seeing nothing.

“Just you and me,” the woman assures him but he doesn’t believe her.

“And your actress buddy, is she a spy too? They start that young?” He walks back to the middle of the room

“I did.” The statement is said flatly, without emotion. But Bruce has spent far too much time analyzing people so he can know if they are a threat. There is emotion there, hidden.

“Who are you?”

“Natasha Romanoff.”

Bruce fidgets, wondering why the subterfuge, why she just doesn’t try to subdue him already. “Are you here to kill me, Miss Romanoff? Because that’s not gonna work out for everyone.”

“No. No. Of course not,” she says calmly, stepping closer to him. “I’m here on behalf of SHIELD.”

“SHIELD. How did they find me?”

“We never lost you, Doctor,” she replies. “We’ve kept our distance, even helped keep some other interested parties off your scent.” She means Ross. Bruce thought things had been a little too quiet in the last few years.

“Why?”

“Nick Fury seems to trust you. But now I need you to come in.” Fury has contacted Bruce before, but he declined the help, preferring to be alone for everyone’s safety.

“What if I said no?”

“I’ll persuade you.” She gives him an enigmatic smile. Bruce is pretty sure he doesn’t want to know what kind of persuasion she means.

He nods “And what if the… Other Guy says no?”

“You’ve been more than a year without an incident.” She steps back, going to the table. “I don’t think you wanna break that streak,” she comments. He really doesn’t, but he will if he has to.

“I don’t every time get what I want,” he replies, gently pushing the cradle. Betty has kids now. Bruce will never be a father. He’s had a chance to be in a lab, do some analysis. Everything about him is slightly radioactive. And even if he wasn’t, he’s not sure what effect the serum would have on any children he would have.

“Doctor, we’re facing a potential global catastrophe.” She’s fiddling with her phone. Bruce is tensed to run, to change if she’s calling someone.

He laughs sourly. “Well, those I actively try to avoid.”

She shows him a photo on her phone, it’s of a glowing cube of some kind. “This is the Tesseract. It has the potential energy to wipe out the planet.” She sits at the table, putting the phone down and pushing it towards him.

Bruce takes his glasses from his coat pocket coming forward to pick up the phone and look at the photo. “What does Fury want me to do? Swallow it?”

“He wants you to find it,” Natasha says, leaning forward. “It’s been taken. It omits a gamma signature that’s too weak for us to trace. There’s no one that knows gamma radiation like you do. It there was, that’s where I’d be.” She sits back again, looking calm.

“So Fury isn’t after the monster?” he asks, removing his glasses. This is certainly different than what Bruce is used to.

“Not that he’s told me,” she says.

“And he tells you everything?” Bruce is still wary. He has to be.

“Talk to Fury. He needs you on this.”

“He needs me in a cage?”

She leans forward, trying to assure him. “No one’s gonna put you in a-”

Bruce moves forward, pounding the table with a fist and putting an edge to his voice, a little bit of the Other Guy. “STOP LYING TO ME!”

Natasha pulls a gun out from under the table, pointing it at him. He hears the click of the trigger. He smiles, standing back up.

“I’m sorry, that was mean,” he apologizes, his voice normal again. “I just wanted to see what you’d do.” He puts his hands out in a calming gesture. “Why don’t we do this the easy way, where you don’t use that, and the Other Guy doesn’t make a mess? Okay? Natasha?”

He watches her as she warily assesses the situation. She lowers the gun, bending her head with a hand to her ear, speaking to someone.

“Stand down. We’re good here.”

He looks at her, smiling with all the charm he can muster.

“Just you and me?”

She stares at him. He suppresses the urge to laugh.

*~*~*~*~*~

When Bruce gets to the Helicarrier, he’s happy enough to meet Steve Rogers. It’s not every day you get to know Captain America. He’s not too fond of the fact that this thing flies, but he uses all of his techniques to keep the Other Guy at bay. Thor seems like a nice enough guy, for an alien. Tony Stark seems a little overly enthusiastic to meet him. Bruce is not unaware of who Tony is and what he does.

Later, when they are in the lab discussing the cube, Bruce gets to know Tony better.

“You know,” Tony says. “You should come by Stark Tower sometime. Top ten floors, all R and D. You’d love it, it’s Candyland.”

Bruce smiles, but shakes his head. “Thanks, but the last time I was in New York I kind of… broke Harlem.”

“Well I promise a stress free environment. No tension. No surprises.” He pokes Bruce with a tiny electrical prod.

“Ow!” Bruce protests, rubbing the spot.

“Nothing?” Tony asks. Steve has walked in, looking very unhappy.

“Hey are you nuts?” Steve asks.

Tony ignores Steve. “You really have got a lid on it, haven’t you? What’s your secret? Mellow jazz? Bongo drums? Huge bag of weed?”

Bruce laughs quietly. Steve is unimpressed.

“Is everything a joke to you?”

They argue about Tony, Bruce handling the Other Guy and SHIELDs real purpose for wanting the cube. When Steve leaves, they keep monitoring the scepter and the computers looking for the cube. Bruce can’t help but stare at Tony’s arms, at the names on both of them. He’s a little surprised to see his there in gold. It means he is Tony’s platonic soul mate, one of two.

“Don’t think I don’t see you looking at them, Bruce,” Tony comments.

“I’m sorry, it’s just I’ve never… I’m sorry,” he says.

“Never what? Seen your name on someone else?” Tony frowns. “Weren’t you dating Ross’s daughter? Brenda? Belinda?”

“Betty. I was. She didn’t….”

“Wow. She didn’t have your name. Rough man, rough. I hope you don’t mind that we’re apparently platonics,” Tony offers, gesturing to his arm.

“No, it’s fine,” Bruce says, concentrating on the data. “You seem like a nice guy and all, but I try not to let people get too close since the accident.”

“I get that. Did you have a mark? Before?”

Bruce nods. “Betty’s name, on my arm. It disappeared afterwards. I think it has something to do with what I injected myself with.” He looks up. “I some favors owed me and found out it was a version of the super soldier serum. What they gave Rogers.”

“Not that, Brucey,” Tony says, shaking his head. “I’ve seen all your files. Rogers had marks before and after the experiment. Yes, marks plural, but we’ll save that conversation for another time. Has to be the gamma radiation in combination with the serum that suppressed it.”

Bruce takes a moment to think about that. If Captain Rogers’s soul marks survived the transformation, it must be something else that made Bruce’s mark vanish. The only thing different is the gamma radiation. “I guess so.”

“Sorry about not having one, it’d be nice to know where your platonic mark would be. Rhodey won’t tell me where his is.”

Bruce laughs. “I think he might be onto something. I wouldn’t tell you either.”

“You’re no fun, big guy. No fun at all,” Tony pouts.

*~*~*~*~*~*

The last thing Bruce remembers is Natasha asking if he was going to change. He thinks he remembers something about Thor and maybe a plane. He’s getting a little better about remembering his time as the Other Guy, about interpreting the images he gets in flashback. He groans as he sits up from the pile of rubble that seems to be a building he crashed into.

“You fell out of the sky.” Bruce looks up to see a security guard standing on top of the pile of rubble.

“Did I hurt anybody?” he asks, looking around.

The guard shrugs. “There’s nobody around here to get hurt. You did scare the hell out of some pigeons though.”

“Lucky,” Bruce comments. He is nude this time, no clothes to cover him whatsoever. Just his luck.

“Or just good aim,” the guard replies. “You were awake when you fell.”

“You saw?” Bruce wonders if this man will get a visit from SHIELD gently asking him to forget anything he did see.

“The whole thing, right through the ceiling. Big and green and buck ass nude. Here…,” he tosses Bruce a pair of pants. “I didn’t think those would fit you until you shrunk down to a regular sized fella.”

Bruce grabs them and start to shimmy into them as he stands. “Thank you.”

There is a moment before the guard speaks again. “Are you an alien?”

“What?”

“From outer space, an alien?”

Bruce shakes his head as he adjusts the pants. “No.”

“Well then, son, you’ve got a condition.”

Bruce gives the man a sardonic smile. He charms a shirt off of the guard and a scooter. Bruce needs to find the rest of the so-called team Fury had been trying to put together. He sees the giant hole in the sky and figures that is probably where he should head for.

He finds them all right smack in the middle of the battle. Tony is nowhere, but Bruce figures he must be flying around in the suit somewhere. Then there is a deafening roar from behind a skyscraper and Tony flies in followed by a giant flying serpent.

“Doctor Banner. Now might be a really good time for you to get angry,” Captain America says.

Bruce looks back at him, with a wry smile. “That’s my secret, Captain. I’m always angry.” He turns back as the serpent comes right to them and lets the Other Guy loose.

*~*~*~*~*

_Hulk smash big worm._

_Hulk help humans._

_Blue man tell Hulk smash._

_Hulk like smash._

_Hulk smash lots._

_Hulk smash worm. Hulk smash ugly thing. Hulk smash all._

_Hulk smash green man._

“Puny God.”

_Hulk smash more._

_Hulk see Red man. Red man fall. Hulk save man._

_Man not talk. Hulk roar._

_Man awake. Hulk like man. Hulk happy_.

*~*~*~*~*~*

Later, in the schwarma place, Bruce asks a question.

“Has anyone looked to see if the Other Guy has a mark?”

Everyone shakes their heads. Tony gestures with a hand. “I’m sure there is plenty of footage out there, I can have JARVIS scan it all.”

“You are without a soul mark, friend Banner?” Thor asks. “I am newly introduced to them and find them intriguing.”

“I had one, but it disappeared when I became… when the accident happened.”

“Something to do with the radiation and the serum?” Natasha asked. Bruce nodded. “I’m familiar with how that works. I am sorry, Bruce.”

He shrugs. “I’ve grown used to the idea. But I don’t envy those that have them.”

Tony grins. “So you’ll be okay as my platonic? Can I convince you to stay? Candyland, remember?”

“I could be persuaded.”

*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Bruce stays at the Tower. The next few years are busy and exciting. He manages to be out of town when Steve brings down SHIELD, exposing HYDRA. But he’s there to help rebuild. He starts mentoring science students, bringing them to the Tower to shine a light on their ideas. With Tony’s assistance he sets up a memorial fund in his mother’s name to help with STEM initiatives. He lets go of his anger and resentment towards Betty.

His life is full. He and Jim Rhodes become friends and always make sure that Tony is never so engrossed in his work that he neglects Pepper. He works with Jane to further her research into Einstein-Rosen bridges. He becomes god father and honorary uncle to all the children that fill the Tower on a day-to-day basis. He looks back at his life and is content.

 


End file.
